Adam White
Executive Director, CLF UK
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Adam White

Adam J White is co-founder and Executive Director of the Concussion Legacy Foundation UK, a non-profit organisation leading the fight against concussions and CTE and dedicated to improving the lives of those impacted in the United Kingdom.

In his early career, Adam worked for the Rugby Football Union in England as a development officer and later went on to sit on the Executive Committee of the England Rugby Football Schools Union; the constituent body responsible for schools rugby in England. While here, Adam became increasingly concerned about the issues of injury and particularly concussion in youth sport. Most notably was the death of 14-year-old schoolboy, Benjamin Robinson, who died in a school rugby match in Ireland in early 2011.  

Since then, Adam has advocated for delaying tackling in youth rugby as a primary way to reduce injuries and particularly brain injury. In 2016, he along with Professor Eric Anderson and Professor Allyson Pollock, called for tackling to be removed from schools’ physical education where it is most-often compulsory for boys in England. 

As an interdisciplinary social researcher in Sport, Education and Health, Adam has authored a number of peer-reviewed journal papers and has co-authored a book critically examining sport; Sport, Theory and Social Problems. Adam completed his doctoral thesis at the University of Winchester in 2018 where he investigated the role of contact sport within school physical education and the issues associated with injury and particularly brain trauma. He is most well-known for being a strong advocate for protecting children's health and brains. 

Continuing the work of his doctoral research, he is interested in the socio-political issues around injury and brain trauma in sport, particularly for children and adolescents. He leads the LIVE research programme that is focused on better understanding the lived experiences of Post-Concussion Syndrome, Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy and other forms of neurodegeneration in athletes and veterans.

In addition to his work at the Concussion Legacy Foundation UK, Adam is currently a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) at Oxford Brookes University in the Department of Sport, Health Sciences and Social Work. He teaches on the BSc Sport, Coaching and Physical Education and the BSc Sport and Exercise Science degrees and has leadership responsibility for research ethics across the Faculty of Health and Life Sciences.

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